Report - North and South Casemates, Western Heights, Dover - January 2013

[sirjonnyp]

The casemates have been on my to do list for sometime, and when my old exploring buddy who stopped doing it back in July said he fancied something this weekend, it seemed like a great opportunity. Back when I had just started off we went looking for the casemates one day, with me guessing the way. We actually got surprisingly close given that all I really knew was that they were 'somewhere sort of West of the other bits' How young and naive I was

History taken from Underground Kent:

During a new fear of invasion from Napoleon III two new dry moats where added to the existing citadel defences. The northern and the southern moat both had their own casemates built. Between these there was also a defensive caponier built, but sadly this was filled in during the 1960's by the Dover Corporation and they gradually destroyed many parts of the Western Heights. The northern casemates are a lot larger than the southern casemates, with six separate rooms whereas the southern casemates had eight.

The stairs were really photogenic. I put this down to the lighting being beautiful, even on an overcast, miserable day.

Anyone who has been here will remember one thing above all others about it - the crawl. The two sides used to be linked by a Caponier, which has since been destroyed. Now the only way to get from one to the other is to use a drainage tunnel, the highlight of which is an 8 foot pipe, which is about as wide as my shoulders! Once I was able to get through I checked the rest of the tunnel to make sure it was worth Giacomo squeezing through. It was, so he got the kit through and then squished himself through too.

I only really got one decent external. Whilst out there we also searched for an alternative method out to avoid the pipe again

Much like the South before it, the upper levels of the actual Casemates themselves are missing their floors.

We then took our alternative method back, and enjoyed a well deserved smoke looking at the view of Dover from outside the fence. I'm very glad to have ticked this site off finally, only seven months after we initially failed at it. Wont be going back in a hurry though, not if that pipe is still there!

Thanks for reading, more photos on my blog.

SJP​